Curious whether anyone prefers their Harbeths this way. I would imagine it's room dependent-- they are obviously voiced with grilles on but if your room is unusual (like mine is) maybe they sound better this way. The highs are getting eaten up by furniture and old ears and a strange loft type room at my place so it's working here.
alan shaw is a smart guy, like all pretty successful, knowledgeable people, he is set in his ways, holds his beliefs firmly and isn’t afraid to state it as such
i don't agree with some his beliefs (e.g., all amps sound the same, just get a big powerful one and you are done) but i can see how and why he holds them
every time input the grilles back on i hear something wierd, off putting, very slight but noticeable. possible phase or cancellations? i like the tonal balance fine but not the sight issues. i have tried grilles on many many times but they do not stay on for long. same thing with both models of harbeths i have owned.
Grilles ON, every time. Like wearing socks in bed, they preserve that gorgeous warmth, although sometimes my feet can get a bit sweaty, especially in summer unless I use a lighter tog duvet.... What was I talking about? Oh yes, Harbeth grilles. Definitely ON.
I spent decades grappling with speakers that threw out exaggerated and fatiguing treble, the most recent being a pair of B&W first generation 685's. To me, my Harbeths are the Holy Grail of speakers for sound, so I'm not going to upset them my removing the Holy Grilles.
One thing I do wish is that they would offer alternative grille colours. How gorgeous they would look in light beige/gold with black Harbeth logo. They offer alternative wood veneers, so why not alternative grilles, the most visible part of the speaker when listening? But I digress.
The reality is that we use things like grilles and cables and different tubes as tone controls to tailor the sound to our individual liking. No more, no less.
Audiophiles are often going for "as much detail transparency as I can get." And so they often take grills off. What often happens, especially in speakers designed with grills, is a slight change in tonal balance where the upper frequencies get a bit more prominence and hence "listen to that added air and detail!"
As others have mentioned, Harbeths are designed to have the grills on.They will have the intended frequency balance. I always preferred grills on sonically.
And aesthetically.
The Harbeths represent such wonderful, understated British design. Beautiful furniture in their own way. With the grills off it ruins this neat aesthetic. They look unfinished, more industrial, more "made in a shop." But....audiophiles LOVE to see every inch of technology. "I paid for those drivers, I damned well wanna look at them!" ;-)
@CD318, regarding the issue of HF hearing loss, keep in mind that condition equally affects both live and reproduced music. I'm in my late 60s an have some HF loss due to age, but I never find live music sounding dull or have any urge to "turn up the treble" at a live presentation of unamplified voice or acoustic instruments. (Sound at a live amplified event is a whole 'nother issue and is often quite poor.)
My goal for my home system is to have it sound as tonally close to what I would hear if the same music were being played live. The human brain actually does a pretty good job of adjusting for hearing loss, so if the speaker is designed to be correct with the grill on, there should be no big acoustic reason to take it off. (That said, appearances play a big role in stereo equipment and some just like the looks of exposed drivers.)
I'd also try to go with what the designer recommends. The Harbeth grilles were factored into every stage of the design process.
He even went to all the trouble of making them difficult to remove!
So unless there is some HF hearing loss...
In any case I've never preferred to use any loudspeaker without grilles. They always sound worse to me and that way seems to be asking for trouble. My days of forever craving more treble are over, I prefer a balanced sound.
Despite all of the endless ribbing of Alan's comments regarding amps, let's not forget that no one was able to accept his challenge of attempting to identify between 2 different amps unsighted.
He was even offering a free pair of the top of the range Harbeth M40s, but still there were no takers.
Somehow it appears we audiophiles strangely seem to lose all of our confidence in the powers of our golden eared superhuman hearing just as soon as someone puts the lights off.
Either that or the blindfold must be loaded with kryptonite.
Just an observation, but when I worked in a stereo store (many, many years ago), I noticed that the vast majority of customers could never resist the urge to turn up the treble and bass controls. This was true regardless of how bright or bassy the system was with all of the controls left neutral.
While tone controls are a thing of the past on much equipment these days, this same trend plays out in its own way these days. People love to tweak things by using different cables, or removing grills.
Harbeth is one of the most tonally neutral speakers out there when it come to reproducing unamplified acoustic music, but it doesn't surprise me when many ignore the designer's advice and remove the grills. They are just turning up the treble control a notch.
i find that with the grilles on they sometimes have some weird / subtle sounding interactions that sound like comb filtering. grilles off the sound is smoother and cleaner.
Alan Shaw says grills on give a flatter response. Sometimes you don't want a flatter response. But the difference is admittedly subtle. I prefer Grills off for listening, but grills on for background music while I work.
grilles off on c7e3s especially and now shl5+. went back and forth many many times but the grilles do not stay on very long. they do sound a little bit brighter but in a good way but the dynamics are significantly improved.
Skylan will sell you a 90 degree angle bracket with several small magnets epoxied to it, so you can free each corner in turn. Or you could make one yourself...
I always listen with the grilles on (40.2A). I have tried them with grilles off and preferred the grilles on. They sound great either way, but to my ears they sound better balanced with them on. There is a slight increase in the highs and mids with them off. Many folks might prefer this sound, but to me it is fatiguing over longer listening sessions. I'm 56 years old and as I've gotten older I find certain high frequencies cause fatigue more than when I was young. There is no question that they look a lot cooler with them off. Sometimes I have to take them off just to remember how beautiful they are. But visual distraction is not ideal for listening. It's like a beautiful girl in church. Hard to hear the message while being distracted by the view. ;)
Oooh. That's a nice solution. I've been doing the paperclip method where I use a pair of need nose pliers to bend about 1/4" of a paperclip and then insert, turn and pull. I feel like I'm going to tear the grille at some point. Doesn't matter much now because my system is set after a bunch of covid changes and the newest incarnation definitely sounds better with the grilles off and nothing is changing anytime soon.
I prefer the way they look without the grills on. I keep them off my P3ESR but have left them on my Super HL5 Plus for the most part, mainly because they are in a high traffic area. I know they don't offer a lot of protection against an accidental scratch or other incidental damage, but...
If you need something to take the grills off, try these:
Grilles off for me. Besides the asthetics and badass Anniversary logo, it gives the 40.2a 0.5db boost from the tweeter which I need. Zero impact on bass driver.
Harbeth also recommends just about any amp over 50 watts. I'm sorry...that's not flying with me. Just saying (-: Back on subject...I enjoy my P3's with Grills on, and don't want to mess with them. Cheers -Don
With the 30.2 there is boosted bass if you remove the grille. Though I highly reccomend removing the grilles on the 30.2, if only to remove the magnet behind the logo that rattles against the cabinet enclosure very loudly during strong bass.
Any Harbeth that I've owned are made to be used with the grilles intact. This is stated by the designer Alan Shaw. It is very difficult to remove the grilles without using the special tool used for removal. Anytime I see used Harbeths for sale they almost always have a rip on the corner of the grille from careless removal!
Entirely speaker- and room-dependent, in my experience. Not the same speakers, but my Wilson Benesch Arcs sound the same, grills on or off, so I leave them on for protection. On the other hand, the grills on my BMC Purevox can have a bit of a blanketing effect on the sound so removing them definitely affects the sound. Go with what works, to your ears, in your room.
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